


Factory Reset

by chaya



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: M/M, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-25
Updated: 2014-11-11
Packaged: 2018-02-09 20:53:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1997400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chaya/pseuds/chaya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-CAWS. Steve gets de-serumed. Bucky struggles to adjust.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"I really do feel fine, Doctor."

"I believe you." Tony's in-house GP smiles and carries the bloodwork over to a machine Steve doesn't recognize, setting the vial in it and coming back with a stethoscope. "You know the drill, Captain. Deep slow breaths."

Steve obliges, squirming a little at how cold the room feels. He doesn't remember the last time he felt cold when it wasn't under fifty degrees Farenheit. "It was a small episode," he says when the stethoscope is moving from his back to his chest. "New York's a lot smoggier than it used to be. I should be fine now that I'm inside."

"Yes, I understand." Dr. Hazuga presses the cold piece of metal to his chest, and he breathes in deeply again. There's a weird familiarity to the way his lungs stutter three fourths the way through a whole breath, the way he has to struggle a little to hold it as long as she needs him to. She nods and walks away again, coming back with a blood pressure band. "Right arm up, if you please."

Steve lifts it. It looks tiny to him, now, the same way it looked massive and disproportionate for the first year or so after the serum. She's leading him over to the scale when a commotion starts just outside the examination room. Three hours ago Steve would have been able to pick out every word, but now, no luck. Just two men arguing.

"Ms. Romanova warned me this might happen," Dr. Hazuga confides. She's straightening his shoulders and taking his height.

"Natasha warned you one of Thor's ex-girlfriends might use magic to ... to reset me to my old body?"

"It is rather like a factory reset, isn't it? No, she warned me that Sergeant Barnes would learn what happened sooner rather than later, and that when he did he'd be down here in a flash." She scribbles calmly on her tablet, taking down numbers and nodding, unbothered by the shouting outside. One of those voices is definitely Clint's.

"Oh, boy." Steve pinches the bridge of his nose.

"I'm going to provide you with an inhaler to use at your discretion until this resolves itself. I assume you've never used one?"

"No, we didn't -" Steve flinches at the sound of something breaking outside. Almost definitely a wall. "We didn't have them back when I was a kid."

"That's fine. I'll show you how to use it. One moment, please." Dr. Hazuga gestures for Steve to sit back down on the examination table, heels clicking as she walks to the locked door and opens it. On the floor, Clint is precariously pinning Bucky, who is frozen in the middle of a grapple that will flip them over. They both stare up at her. "Sergeant Barnes, if you can promise to keep yourself in line and neither destroy anything in my exam room nor steal away my patient, you may come in and see your friend."

There is a long pause. Then,

"Yes, ma'am."


	2. Chapter 2

Bucky sits in the corner for the rest of the checkup, silent and staring. Dr. Hazuga has clearly been briefed, because she doesn't question it, even when Bucky abruptly gets up and leaves before Steve is finished thanking her. Steve stares after him.

"Sorry," Steve apologizes, "he's-"

"I know." Dr. Hazuga pats his shoulder.

Steve is released with two inhalers, a bottle of daily multivitamins, and several pamphlets on the ins and outs of asthma. (Most of it is familiar, but there's been some progress on the subject since Steve had to deal with it. He reads in the elevator on the way up to his room.)

It feels strange to do it, but he knows he has to - when he shuts the door and puts his materials down, he strips down and looks in the mirror.

A long time ago, he had to do this in reverse. He stared at every new muscle, the new length to his limbs and torso, the squareness of his jaw. The breadth of his shoulders had felt like it had tripled. His arms were as thick as his thighs had been.

Now, the opposite. The long mirror hung on the wall cuts him off at the hips instead of the knees, and the collarbones and ribs jut out as they used to. Even his hair is a little different, more limp, his jaw back to its familiar point. He looks at himself, moves his arms, teaches his brain to relearn. If he's going to have to twiddle his thumbs and wait for Thor to get this sorted out, he might as well not frustrate himself with clumsiness on top of everything else.

There's a sharp knock on the door. Steve pulls the sweatpants back on and goes to see who it is - Bucky's standing there, jaw set and carrying a pile of heavy blankets. Steve waits for him to say something, but he doesn't, and seems to get irritated when Steve doesn't just take the pile from him.

"They're for you," Bucky says curtly, holding them out a little further.

Steve takes the bundle and shifts on his feet, looking up. It's weirdly right, to have to tilt his chin up just this far to look at Bucky. The angle is so familiar. "Thanks," he says, and then, because he wants to keep Bucky talking, "Hey, um, thanks for coming to see me earlier. In medical."

Bucky, skittish, looks away. "Yeah."

He looks... uncomfortable. Moreso than usual. "Is everything okay, Buck?"

Bucky seems to force himself to engage in eye contact. "You should put something on," he says abruptly. "You get _cold_ , remember?"

Steve blinks. "Yeah, I. I did, I do. Good point. I'll go throw that t-shirt back on." He turns and walks to the chair he left it on, leaving the door open intentionally in the hopes that Bucky might follow him inside, or at least stay there. Nobody's seen him come out of his room for the past two days, and yes, Steve's been asking around and counting. "It's pretty weird, huh?"

"What's weird?" Bucky's not coming in, but at least he's still there. Steve pulls the shirt over his head and looks over his shoulder.

"Me being little."

"It's not weird. You're normal again."

Steve doesn't know what to say to that, and the thread of the conversation stutters just long enough for Bucky to turn and walk away.

**

Tony rush orders him some new clothes - too many, really - in his new/old size. Steve huffs as he digs through the rack, pulling out the skinny jeans and cargo shorts (what even is that trend?) and the shirts that are clearly from some pre-teen store with cartoon characters on the front. He shoves it all into an empty hamper and resolves to box and donate them when he has time. Tony is an asshole.

**

The hearing loss gets to him the most, and he considers going and mentioning it to Dr. Hazuga. There are things he could wear in his ear; for now, he does his best to get back into the habit of arranging himself with his head tilted just so, his good ear this way and his bad one that way, leaning in a little closer than he used to. Natasha notices immediately but, as ever, doesn't actually say anything about it.

"He's started writing things on the grocery list," she says the next morning over coffee.

"Really?" Steve gets to his feet, fighting the tremble of legs that are no longer used to having to work so hard for such a simple task. He walks to the electronic board on the refridgerator. Sure enough, it's Bucky's handwriting, only slightly masked by the thick stylus. Steve reads the items line by line.

"Ingredients for something?" Natasha guesses.

"A stew." Steve forces his voice to come out steady. "He used to make it sometimes."

And that's what's so painful about it, for some reason - Steve never made it, _Bucky_ did. And he knows Bucky isn't going to make it now, might not even know why he wrote those items there.

Bucky still does a lot of 'old' things without really thinking about it. He avoids social situations and ignores people whenever possible, but he holds doors for Pepper and Natasha. Steve can afford as many sketchbooks as he wants now, but the few times he's visited Bucky's room he's spotted the small pile of paper scraps, like the one Bucky used to keep for Steve to scribble and practice on. Bucky never mentions it and never gives him the pile. Steve's not sure Bucky knows why he collects the pieces of paper.

Steve sits back down and finishes his coffee.

"Don't look so glum, soldier." Natasha punches his arm gently. "We'll get through this."

**

Steve is talking with Sam on the phone when Bucky walks by, frowns, and starts pulling his hoodie up and off. Now just in a t-shirt, Bucky pushes the hoodie into Steve's hands.

"...Sam, hold on. Bucky, what--?"

"The Tower's cold," Bucky says gruffly, still standing there. He's _waiting for him to put it on_.

Steve collects his thoughts, trying to get on whatever Bucky's wavelength is. "Buck, it was one thing when we were roommates and there was nobody to see what an idiot I looked like wearing your giant clothes, but now,"

"Fine." Bucky grabs it back and walks away, leaving Steve alone and confused. Sam is saying something on the phone.

"Sorry, Sam, what were you saying?"

"I said, what the hell did I just miss? Is Bucky talking?"

"Sometimes," Steve says. "I think he's mad that I'm not bundled up enough. Jeez, some things really don't change."

"So let him mother hen you a little. It probably feels familiar."

"Then it'll also feel familiar when I remind him I'm not a child." Steve listens to himself and winces. "Okay, yeah. Maybe I've been getting a little prickly about it. Sorry. Tony's being a pain, everything's sore again, I can't go jogging..."

"That sucks, dude."

Bucky comes back. He's holding an emerald knit sweater he must have taken out of Steve's closet. Steve takes a breath.

"Okay, hand it over."

**

Natasha brings takeout from the best Chinese place in Manhattan, and Steve inhales the first few bites before realizing that all his developed resistance to spicy food is completely gone. His mouth is burning.

"It _never ends_ ," Steve mutters under his breath, and shoots Clint a grateful look when the man nudges a steamed pork dumpling onto his plate. That and some soy sauce is definitely manageable.

"I've got an egg roll," Natasha says, and nudges that over too. There's sounds of someone in the kitchen, Steve realizes, but as he looks around the table everyone's here. Everyone but-

"Bucky, do you, do you want to come eat?"

The answer is immediate. "No." There are microwave sounds, and then the smell of... beef, and vegetables. Broth. Steve blinks. The others are eating away, already masters in Giving Bucky Space And Not Trying To Talk To Him Unless He Initiates Which Is Never. (Only Steve is able to break these rules without Bucky leaving so quickly he might as well leave a puff of smoke.)

Steve eats the rest of the dumpling, and is halfway through the egg roll when the microwave beeps and Bucky comes out with a bowl and spoon. Instead of leaving with it, he plunks it down in front of Steve, looks down, and walks away.


	3. Chapter 3

With all the injured, getting back was going to be two days on foot. Steve made sure the weakest were bundled up in the tank, safe from windchill, before clambering into the tent that the others had insisted he take.

(They had only scrounged up seven between the lot of them, but they were keeping the campfires going all night.)

Bucky smiled lopsidedly from the bedroll. He looked stretched thin in a way that was new and a little troubling, but who could blame him? The war wasn't easy, and Steve was just happy to _see_ him, alive and whole. Steve drank in the very sight of the other man before securing the flap on the tent and straddling him.

Bucky's arms wrapped around his shoulders, and Steve came in closer, covering Bucky with his body, pressing kisses against his neck. Hands everywhere, stroking, checking, remembering familiar skin with new fingertips. "Missed you," Steve murmured against Bucky's skin, only pulling his hands away to get the battered brown jacket off his shoulders before coming back in again. Bucky made a strange sound in the back of his throat as Steve pressed closer.

"You're so..." Steve felt one of Bucky's hands drift over his bicep, the new hugeness of it, then across the breadth of his shoulders. "It's so _strange_ ," Bucky finished finally, not sounding wondering so much as lost. Steve didn't notice at the moment. Too wrapped up in the familiar smell of him, the minute details of his face. Bucky's eyelashes fanned on his cheeks as he closed his eyes and when Steve reached between Bucky's legs, there was... no reaction, save for a brief flinch. Steve's chest twisted.

"We don't have to have a reunion just yet," Steve said, although it's what he wanted more than anything. "You're still healing up."

"I'm fine," Bucky murmured, trying to prove his point by hooking a leg around Steve's to get their hips to line up. Something pressed against a sore spot, though, and he grimaced.

"What'd they _do_ to you, Buck?" Steve rolled on to his side and frowned, reaching to hike Bucky's shirt up only to get his hand swatted away.

" _Me_ _?_ What'd they do to _y_ -" Bucky bit his lip and shook his head, kicking his legs out straight and shoving his shoulder into the bedroll in the way that meant he was tucking in for the night. Steve stared at the back of his head, hard and confused. "Later," Bucky said finally. "When I'm washed up. We'll have that big reunion."

"Okay, Buck." Steve drew in a quiet breath, looking again at the tent flap and then at his own bedroll. "Whatever you want."

**

Some grateful Swiss town put them up for a night in a half-wrecked hotel that looked over what used to be a beautiful glade. Not like there were any tourists around to buy the damned rooms, anyway.

Steve saw his first opportunity since Italy; he rinsed off his hands and face in the basin, did a last check in the cracked mirror by the window, and snuck down the hall as soon as he heard Falsworth's snore across the hall. Bucky's door was locked, so Steve rapped lightly, quiet enough that nobody else should hear.

"Steve," Bucky whispered as the door inched open. He sounded worried. "Hey, pal."

"Hey yourself." Steve grinned. "Lonely in there?"

Bucky mumbled something, but Steve didn't quite catch it - Morita's door was cracking open, and Steve slipped into Bucky's room as quick as he could before being seen. They both listened to the soft footfalls that meant Jim was just going to the washroom. Nobody suspected.

Steve laughed softly and smiled, looking up to meet Bucky's eyes. There was a little mirth in them, but something else, too, something like apprehension that Steve couldn't quite work out.

"He didn't see me," Steve said, because that must be what was worrying him. He leaned in and kissed him softly, for the first time in what felt like years, skin tingling from the familiar feeling of Bucky's body. His own body was new, but it had no trouble remembering Bucky's. His hand found Bucky's jawline and tipped it back just a little. How strange that _Steve_ was the taller one now.

"Steve," Bucky whispered, turning his head so the next kiss landed on his stubbled cheek. Steve groaned and swept his fingers through Bucky's hair, but after another unresponsive moment he realized something was off.

"What is it?"

"I can't... it feels wrong."

"What feels wrong?" Steve looked at Bucky, then at the shut door. Was it because the men were so nearby?

"It's not _them_ , dummy, you-" Bucky stopped himself and smoothed the lapel of Steve's borrowed, ill-fitting pajamas. "You're so _different_."

"I'm the same," Steve replied quietly.

"Steve,"

"I'm _exactly_ the same."

"Yeah, well, I can't help it if- you used to be so _small_ , Stevie, now I gotta get on tip-toe just to glare at you, feels like, none of it's what I remember."

"It's not like Alice in Wonderland, Buck. They didn't give me anything to make me bigger or smaller whenever I wanted."

"I _know_ that." Bucky's mouth formed a thin line and he continued to refuse to make eye contact, staring at Steve's shirt instead, then the window. "Some other time, okay? We'll try again. When we ain't so rushed."

"'Try again'? Was this trying?" Steve felt some kind of anger rising in him, but at what he wasn't sure. At how distant Bucky was being, at his own body, for being weak for so long and now alienating his lover, it was never right, nothing was  _ever_ right - "I'm better, Buck. I don't have to stop to catch my breath anymore, I can - I can get it up and keep it up without any trouble, we could even-"

"You think I don't know you can fuck?" Bucky turned sharply to glare at him, the bitterness instant. "I've seen you throw a Kraut over a damn river. You're healthy as a goddamn ox."

"But you wish I was still dying, is that it?"

Steve regretted it the second he was done spitting it out, because from Bucky's expression it looked like he was just stabbed in the gut.

"Shit. ...I'm sorry, Buck."

"Yeah, you're real sorry."

"It wasn't-"

"You wanted to be strong enough to beat up the bullies? You wanted to go overseas and make a difference? You got every damn thing you wanted. Don't be sorry. Be happy for yourself."

" _Bucky_."

"Me, I just wanted you safe. I see you bulked up and huge getting shot at every God damned day, and I gotta sit back and pick 'em off before they can spot that big damn shield of yours. You got everything you wanted. You know what I got? I got the one thing that's scarier than holding you back home and feeling your chest stutter. Seeing you finally get the opportunity to throw yourself into even bigger danger, still actin' like you're invincible, and you _still_ ain't? Your heaven is my hell, Steve."

**

The ceiling in Steve's room was shadowed and cracked. He stared at it for hours, barely sleeping.


	4. Chapter 4

It gets drizzly on the patio and Steve just moves his chair under the awning, not minding the cool breeze as he continues to sketch the skyline. The colored pencils were a lucky decision, because the clouds behind the buildings make for some incredible purples and yellows behind the silhouetted buildings. Everything's faint, coated in silver, and it's a good challenge.

The sliding door opens, and after a minute it registers that nobody has come outside. Steve looks up from his work and over his shoulder. Bucky is standing there.

"You'll get sick," Bucky says awkwardly; the voice of someone afraid of confrontation but braving it anyway.

"I'll come in in a minute," Steve negotiates, and turns back to his sketch. After a few seconds, though, he looks over again, and Bucky's pained expression crumbles his resolve. "Okay, okay." As soon as Bucky hears the familiar clack-clack of Steve gathering all the pencils up, his face brightens a little and he disappears back into the Tower.

By the time Steve comes inside, Bucky has already moved one of the armchairs to face the biggest window, and he's working on moving an end table over too.

"You can still," Bucky says awkwardly, gesturing to the scene outside. "Just."

 _You can still draw, just inside where it's safe_ , Steve's mind translates. Seventy years ago they had this argument a dozen times about the sunset and the fire escape, when it was too overcast and chilly outside for Bucky to leave Steve alone out there for more than five minutes without clucking about 'an extra sweater and a blanket, and actually, just come in side, Rogers, I saw that shiver'.

Something warm but painful twists in Steve's gut and he sets his pencils on the end table, sits in the chair, and opens the sketchbook back up in his lap. Behind him Bucky is still pacing, rearranging furniture.

"Just sit with me, Buck."

A beat. "What?"

"Just... you don't have to do anything else. I just want you around. Please?"

Steve hasn't been able to manage so direct a request of Bucky since they got him into the Tower, aside from a few begging moments about eating every day. He's too worn down now. He needs this from Bucky. Just needs his presence, something lasting, not a quick mothering before the other man disappears again for another five hours, day, three days.

Bucky seems to realize it too, because when Steve gets the courage to look over the back of the chair, Bucky's looking at him with an odd expression, surprised, unsure. Finally he crosses the room, handing the throw pillow in his hand to Steve, who obediently leans forward and arranges it behind him to give his back a bit of relief. Bucky looks at the huge glass window, then at Steve, and finally sits on the floor next to the armchair and looks out over the sky.

 _Like a dog_ , Steve thinks sickly, and curls his long thin fingers around the violet pencil. It doesn't look exactly like it used to. The colors are all faded, some almost indistinguishable from the others.

Bucky doesn't move next to him. He just sits upright and watches the clouds creep further and further away in slow motion. Steve shades the shadows of the clouds on his paper, emphasizing the light coming through the other side of them, and takes a break once his hand starts to cramp.

"When there wasn't anything interesting to draw outside, I used to draw you," he risks.

Bucky looks up, eyes flat and unresponsive. "I remember."

Steve's genuinely surprised. "You do?"

Bucky nods. "Took a long time. But it made you happy." He looks back out the window, and Steve scrutinizes the reflection in the glass before looking back down at his paper. Resumes shading.

"When I'm done with this, maybe." He takes in a shallow breath. "If you felt up to it, we could-"

"I don't look the same anymore."

Steve's hand stills over the paper. Bucky gets up, head turned away, and walks down the hallway.

**

Steve remembers when he was practicing how to draw cloth for class. He arranged Bucky on the threadbare couch and took down one of the flimsier curtains to drape over his lap. Bucky got comfortable on his side, head propped up on one hand, fussing with the thin cotton of his undershirt and the delicate folds of the too-thin material over his legs.

"So... three fabrics for practice, and a fella just for eye candy?"

Steve rolled his eyes. "You're a better subject than an old sofa with some sheets on it."

"Aw, Rogers. You're gonna make me blush."

"Quit that smirk."

"But it suits me!"

"Says you."


End file.
